6 SCLEROTINIA DISEASE OF THE GOOSEBERRY. [APRIL, 



young wood. In the case of young bushes especially, a con- 

 siderable proportion of the young shoots may be attacked 

 and much weakened or killed — a fact which has caused 

 growers to speak of the present disease as "die-back." In 

 many of the shoots which are thus killed, the fungus can be 

 found wintering in the dead buds, and producing fresh 

 conidiophores in the following spring. Such a dead shoot 

 is shown in Fig. 7. These infested dead shoots may consti- 

 tute a prolific source of infection. If, as I have seen happen 

 in not a few cases, the prunings of Botrytis-aEected bushes 

 are left lying in a heap in a corner of the plantation or garden 

 (instead of being promptly burned), they will develop during 

 the following spring an abundant crop of powdery tufts of 

 Botrytis, the spores of which, carried by the wind in countless 

 numbers, will spread the disease through the plantation. 

 There is also the danger of cuttings being taken from 

 B 0 trytis -mi ected bushes, when many of the young bushes thus 

 obtained will become diseased. In one case which was 

 investigated it was found that a lot of 2,000 young bushes of 

 "Crown Bob,'' planted out direct from a nursery, were already 

 diseased — the young shoots harbouring the Botrytis-stage of 

 the fungus. 



Lastly, the fungus occasionally attacks the berry and tufns 

 it rotten. I have seen berries attacked and destroyed in 

 plantations in Kent, Surrey and Somerset. The first sign 

 of the appearance of the disease on the berry is the browning 

 of the skin at some spot; this browning gradually extends 

 until one side of the berry shows obvious signs of softening 

 and of being badly diseased. The Botrytis fructification, in 

 the form of the characteristic ashy-grey "mould," then soon 

 appears on the surface of the discoloured portions (see 

 Fig. 8), and the berry in a week or so is turned completely 

 rotten and decays. A case which occurred last season at 

 Reigate, Surrey, may be mentioned as showing the course 

 usually followed by the disease and the manner in which it 

 spreads through the bush from one part to another. In this 

 case the bushes, which were of the "Lancashire Lad " variety, 

 were growing in a garden. At the beginning of June a num- 

 ber of the berries hanging on several of the bushes attracted 

 attention by suddenly appearing "blighted"; it was also 



